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under the umbrella of AfriAfya, and ALIN(EA). Additionally, Fortunecity
(1999) discusses an important factor in qualitative research, which is that
researchers are often involved in the situation of the research. This often
brings to the study a subjective element and involves the generation of a
theory. This approach was applied to the study in order to gain an in depth
understanding of the socio-economic gains involving women and ICTs in
rural areas. Additionally, through the content analysis of data, the study
induced supportive or otherwise new theories in the use and application of
lCTs amongst rural African women. The qualitative approach catered for
subjectivity through close interaction with selected informants. In this way,
the study captured the feelings and attitudes of various sub categories of
women. Additionally, given the fact that lCTs are relatively new phenomena
in many African countries, spanning only about four decades, the qualitative
approach was deemed useful as it identified cases that could serve as a
sp'ringboard to the development and implementation of ICTs amongst rural
African women.
6.3 Research Design
Bless and Smith (2000) contend that research design relates directly to the
testing of hypotheses, and is a specification of the most adequate operations
to be performed in order to test a specific hypothesis under given conditions.
According to the authors, a research design asks an important question,
namely what steps should be taken in order to demonstrate that a particular
hypothesis is true and that all other possible hypotheses must be rejected. It
also pays particular attention to three important areas, namely: the focus of
the study, which takes into account the current status of the subjects in
question; their orientations i.e. their beliefs and attitudes; and their actions.
For example, the focus of this study is rural women and lCTs. The study was
interested in understanding the infrastructure and resource base of the
environments in which rural women of South Africa and Kenya reside, and
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